My element to model was “branching”. Whenever I am approached with a problem, I immediately try to define the underlying issue or problem to be solved. With this project that meant my mind was racing with trying to define what “branching” was before I could even think about modeling it. So I turned to my notebook and did a 20 minute brainstorm about what branching is and what it means. 
Step 1: Brainstorm

To the left you can see my notes from my brain storm. My thought process started with what came into my mind first when I thought of branching: nature. Trees and leaves utilize a branching structure to deliver nutrients to all parts of the tree in the same way humans’ circulatory system sends blood out. From there I thought of Fibonacci numbers and how they form branching structures such as prime factorization. Other natural occurrences such as rivers and water sources form as water takes the form of least resistance when flowing down hill. As water freezes into snowflakes they freeze into branching patterns.

From here I thought about the shape of branching and how and why you might use it from a theoretical perspective, such as family trees or animal kingdom connections.

Around this point I was trying to define what branching is or what purpose it serves. I concluded that the purpose of branching is to show or utilize connections to a source. This lead to more abstract conclusions such as “branches” of a business, as all the individual franchises of a company “branch” from the source, headquarters. In a tree both branches and roots “branch” from the main source, the body of the tree, but serve opposite purposes: branches take nutrients from the source and distribute them out while roots take far flung nutrients and consolidate them into the source. They both qualify as branching, but their purpose is opposite.

At this point in my brainstorming I had two criteria I decided was needed for “branching”:

1. Must have a source or a point of origin that all elements can trace back to
2. Must have at least two paths from a certain point. This means a line is not considered branching.

Prototyping Examples:

Here are my 5 examples of how to utilize branching.

1. My first example is a leaf rubbing. This is utilizing natural branching patterns in a leaf by showing its veins. Of particular interest is viewing how the leaf naturally maximizes efficiency by making the earlier branches of veins larger to handle a larger flow than the branches that impact less area.
2. My second example is showing a frayed rope. Rope is made of many wound elements to create a stronger center section. By combining the weaker individual strands together it creates an element that is stronger than the individual parts. The branches form together to create a strong center origin.
3. My third example is showing how the toy K’nex utilizes branching to create both two and three dimensional shapes. By using angles in the connection pieces it allows for greater branching options and thereby a greater variety of branching.
4. My fourth example is a brainstorm/planning branching structure. This might be utilized in a presentation format, with the main idea being the topic, the three options being possible points or solutions to a problem and the facts being the  elements supporting that particular point or solution. Each of the facts supports the option/idea it is associated with, and each of the option/ideas supports the main point.
5. My fifth example shows how branching can be used to show relationships through emphasis on the combining. When red paint is mixed with blue paint, the mixture comes out purple. Branching can be used to show a physical mixing in the relationship between red, blue and purple.